Senior Bowl: Sights, stats and sounds (with Tout videos)

"We jelled as a team. We just jelled a little late," Blue assistant coach Justin Eckert

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"I'm looking forward to being sore tomorrow. There's no better 'sore' than the sore you feel after a Friday night football game," Newbury's Alex Kania

"We couldn't punch it in. Three turnovers in the red zone. That's not how you want to do it," Blue's Nick DeLisa (Mentor)

"I'm so happy I played in this. I had a blast. This is going to be a longtime memory for me. Something I can tell my kids about," John Stepec, of Lake Catholic

By the numbers

7: Fumbles by the Blue team, one of which they lost

24: Carries by Juwan Ford (Euclid), a Senior Bowl record

25: Rushing yards for Blue team

81: Game-time temperature

184: Passing yards for the blue team

194: White team rushing yards, a Senior Bowl record

2,900: Estimated crowd for the third annual N-H Senior Bowl

Good ice-breaker

Ken Ranallo, coach of the 1974 Wickliffe baseball team that was inducted into the N-H High School Sports Hall of Fame at halftime of the game, admitted he was nervous prior to arriving for the festivities on Friday.

"Some of these guys I haven't seen in 39 years," Ranallo said. "A lot of them I haven't seen. I was worried I'd be walking by them, bump shoulders with them and they wouldn't know who I was."

Ranallo said the team is also being honored by the Wickliffe school district in August. The Senior Bowl festivities served as the ideal icebreaker for that event.

"The kids -- ha, how about that? They're 57 years old and I still call them kids -- had fun tonight," Ranallo said. "This was a lot of fun to see everybody together again."

Head games

A time-honored tradition left a few fans puzzled prior to Friday night's kickoff. Players in all-star games customarily trade helmet decals during the week of practice. That meant, for instance, many players on Friday had Mentor Cardinal decals on their helmet or stripes similar to that worn on South helmets, just to name a few. Some fans were caught off-guard.

Hours before the kickoff Friday night, music was blaring from the locker room when Euclid assistant Mike Rezzolla entered and told them to tone things down a little because he had an announcement to make.

"They looked up and there wasn't a player there whose face I recognized," Rezzolla said.

That's when Damon Washington filled him in.

"Hey Coach," said Washington of the Blue team, "You're in the wrong locker room."

Rezzolla was a member of the White team coaching staff.

Sound check

Noelle Bayer, a recent graduate of Lake Catholic, sang a beautiful rendition of the "Star Spangled Banner" prior to kickoff. It took a little bit of an adjustment because of the echo heard off the stands at Jerome T. Osborne Stadium.

"I tried to listen to my voice and not the echo," Bayer said. "That threw me off a little bit, but it went all right."